Daniel Gomez/Special to the Reporter-News
Ken Riediger's model Santa Fe locomotive, which is 1/87-inch scale, makes its way around his garage shop filled with model railroad scenery. Riediger, president of the Abilene Society of Model Railroading, has an open house each November, which is National Model Railroad Month.

Daniel Gomez/Special to the Reporter-News
Ken Riediger's red, white and blue centennial model locomotive, with 45 cars attached, makes it way down the tracks around his hand-constructed 1/87 scale train tracks filled with scenes of different towns.

Daniel Gomez/Special to the Reporter-News
Ken Riediger checks his storage rails underneath his display track. He received his first model train set when he was 12, and has been collecting them for more than 40 years.

The preschooler's passion for trains leads him to wake his parents in the middle of the night when he hears the horns blasting or to direct them to railroad tracks anywhere in Abilene.

The couple went back later, some of the 100 people who visited Riediger's impressive garage shop display of model railroads.

Riediger is the president of the Abilene Society of Model Railroading, which had an open house Saturday and Sunday, coinciding with National Model Railroad Month.

Kedl and Cauthern went at the event without Brycen to ask Riediger about holiday gift ideas for the young train fan who loves Thomas the Tank Engine.

"This is awesome," Kedl said as she looked at Riediger's homemade elaborate two-level display. The HO-scale set, which is 1/87-inch scale, featured a Midwestern 1970s-era, small-town model scenery and three moving trains of about 26 cars.

"He'll wake me up at 3 in the morning and say, 'Choo-choo!' when one goes by or he hears the horn," Cauthern said of Brycen.

Riediger said his interest in trains began when he was a boy in Wilmar, Minn. He said Burlington Northern trains came right beside his country farm house, and the rear brakeman would throw candy and gum to him.

"I got my first train set when I was 12 years old," Riediger said.

Cody Hilliard, secretary of the 21-year-old Abilene Society of Model Railroading club, said he, too, became interested in model trains when he was 10 to 12 years old.

"There's so many aspects to it," Hilliard said. "You have electrical, woodworking, scenery making and a lot of other stuff too. It gives you something to do and it's a healthy hobby."

Hilliard said Abilene Society of Model Railroading will have another community event Dec. 8 and 9 at its club, 2043 N. Second St. behind the old Coca-Cola plant. For information, visit www.trainweb.org/asmr.